Friday 6 December 2013 10.13 EST
First published on Friday 6 December 2013 10.13 EST

The elements have shown scant mercy over 48 hours. A mini tsunami in Humberside. A violent storm generating a powerful tidal surge in the North Sea. Thousands of people forced to evacuate their homes in towns along the east coast of England. A freak event perhaps. But there does seem to be a number of them.

The government talks a good game about emergency planning. "History has taught us to expect the unexpected. Events can and do take place that by their nature can not be anticipated exactly. Response arrangements therefore need to be flexible in order to adapt to the circumstances at the time while applying good practice, including lessons from previous emergencies, and safeguarding the UK's constitutional settlement."

Consult the handbook for dealing with these extremities, a document buffed up by the Cabinet Office earlier this year. It's all there: preparedness, direction, communication, integration, co-operation, anticipation. All angles covered; no stone unturned. And certainly it was all go in Whitehall, as the environment secretary, Owen Paterson – a man who sees a pleasing upside to global warming – convened multiple gatherings of the emergency committee Cobra. And yet, as we have seen these past two days, theoretical plans provide limited defence against the rages of nature.

Consider for a moment that "constitutional settlement" mentioned in the Cabinet Office document, for the state of it says much about the coalition. And it matters today as the storms subside, the wreckage shows its face and communities regroup. The people who matter here are not ministers. They are council leaders and local politicians and local emergency planners. We talk of localism and yet, with its grip on the purse-strings and mile-high bully pulpit, Whitehall cedes as little real control as possible. But Whitehall's writ is so easily disrupted by nature. When calamity strikes, local government comes into its own.

Look again at the division of responsibilities. It falls to local authorities and their partners in the emergency services to provide rapid assistance, open evacuation and rest centres, manage the local transport and traffic networks, liaise with "essential service providers", manage public health, mobilise trained emergency social workers, deal with environmental health issues, such as contamination and pollution. They co-ordinate the recovery process. They're at the heart of this. Of course, central government is there to help. On Thursday night, as flood waters lashed Great Yarmouth, the emergency effort was augmented by the army.

But it's local government that people rely on when disaster strikes, so one might wonder if it deserves the constant drubbing it receives from the financial and ideological axe-grinders in government. Between 2010 and 2015, state funding to local government will be cut by 43% in real terms, more than twice the level of cuts experienced across government as a whole. On Thursday, as the storms wreaked havoc and local communities bore the brunt, the analysts Grant Thornton released the third in a series of reports into the financial health of local authorities. They are coping well, given "the financial challenges they face and delivering against their financial plans", it said. "However, the funding reductions are some of the largest in the public sector and set to get deeper. Meanwhile, demographic and economic pressures on authorities' services are increasing."

Local authorities hear much that is scathing from the Department for Communities and Local Government, and the media – egged on by the ever disapproving secretary of state, Eric Pickles – about the salaries paid to staff, the need to get rid of staff, even the frequency of bin collections and the circulation of municipal publications. What they rarely hear is any recognition that on days like these they comprise the cavalry. Perhaps they'll hear it today.